We hope we get a camp site at the Kentucky Horse Park!

We had decided that we wanted to spend some time around Lexington, Kentucky, and we knew where we wanted to stay. So we were disappointed to find that the large campground adjacent to the Kentucky Horse Park was totally booked for the days we planned to be visiting.

Then we found out that they have a first-come-first-served area with only 30-amp electricity. But we worried if it too would be completely full. We sure hoped we could get a camp site at the Kentucky Horse Park! We arrived around 1:00 on a Thursday, hoping there would be just one spot for us in that grassy field. We actually found many spots available--Whew! So we pulled the motor home under the shade of the tall trees surrounding this grassy field, plugged into the electricity, and got settled in. That was easier than we had thought!

The electrical poles are at random intervals throughout this grassy field. RVs are allowed to park anywhere they want in order to get level and still get plugged in. So they are parked willy-nilly all over that pasture.

There is a road that runs through this grassy area, but no RVs are allowed to stop and camp on that road. We've seen lots of campgrounds that don't allow parking on the grass, but we've never seen one that insists there is no parking on the pavement!

We have a pretty full itinerary of places we want to see while we are in this area, so we won't have a day to see the Kentucky Horse Park that is next to our campground. It was about closing time, but we decided to ride our bikes over to the park, and we enjoyed the statues out front. These two metal colts were enjoying the grass in front of the visitor center.

This famous horse was saddled and ready for the next race. This is a statue of Secretariat, an American Triple Crown Winner, that still holds the fastest time in all three races. When we went inside the visitor center, they were getting ready to close. They said it would be fine to walk around the grounds, even though the buildings would be closed and the horses would have already been moved to the adjacent pastures.

This fit perfectly into our schedule, so we had an evening walk inside the park for free! We did find a few of the horses, grazing close to the park. What beautiful animals!

This part of Kentucky is known for its horses, and we envisioned miles of white fences encircling these horse ranches. We were a little surprised to find more black fences, rather than the white we imagined.

The park had many statues of famous horses, but this was Mark's favorite. This is Staff Sergeant Reckless, who served with the Marines in the Korean War. She made trips from the ammunition supply point to the firing sites. During a five day run in March 1953, she made 51 round-trips, carrying 386 rounds of ammunition over 35 miles through open rice padddies and up mountains as enemy fire exploded around her. She also carried the wounded to safety, even though she was wounded twice. She spent her last years at the marine base in Camp Pendleton, where she is buried. Now that's a horse!

While most of the employees had left for the day, we found some trainers still working with horses. They were practicing the perfect posture and techniques to use for the horse and trainer for the upcoming show.

Some very big horse shows can be held in this barn at the Kentucky Horse Park. Those horses seem very far away when we walked to the end of the barn.

We found a few displays still open, and we really enjoyed our quiet walk through the park this evening.

This is a very big park, and as we continued to walk, we found that a large crowd was still working this evening. We asked a friendly couple some questions, and got information about the horse show that is taking place this week. They are from Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, owners of two horses that are trained in Ohio, and are now here in Kentucky. They are like many other horse owners that go to shows all over the country. Now we know why the campground is completely full.

After talking for close to an hour and watching the horses that are training this evening, we made our way back out of the Kentucky Horse Park. We found more interesting displays, like this world map made from horse shoes . . .

and this over-sized chair that was once part of a jumping display for a horse show.

Our plan for this evening was to take a bicycle ride. So after that long walk through the park, we got back on our bikes. We had read about the Legacy Trail that links the Kentucky Horse Park with downtown Lexington.

It's a smoothly paved path that led us through some pretty parts of the country-side near Lexington.

It also took us around parts of the agricultural research work of the University of Kentucky. It was a nice ride, but after our long walk and a nice bike ride, our legs were tired. We are glad we found a camp site at the Kentucky Horse Park, and we know we are going to like it here!